Relocating to Santa Cruz Advice (San Jose, San Francisco: university, living in, restaurants)

[Agnimitra42]

Hello Hello! This is my very first post so please bear with me. I am about to be a recent college graduate and two of my good friends have invited me to live with them in Santa Cruz. Now, I am no stranger to the area (I was raised in San Jose and Gilroy) but I would still like some advice.

First, after living in a very small town this is quite important to me, is Santa Cruz a gay friendly town? I know that it's very tolerant and accepting but that doesn't necessarily mean there is a gay scene or that there are extensive dating options. I live in Arcata and, while it's gay friendly, there's not much selection outside the campus.

Secondly, how good is the public transportation? I would love to be able to live without a car as much as possible. I hear there's a fairly decent bus system and that it's very bike friendly.

Any and every form of advice is helpful. Thank you!

[mayorhaggar]

I think your main concern should be whether you can get a decent job within the range of a decent commute there. Other than the university there isn't much going on in Santa Cruz, the county as a whole has a fairly large population (250,000+) but they're spread out and scattered around. A lot of people drive over the hill on Hwy 17 to work in the San Jose area.

No there's not much of a gay scene from what I saw when I lived there for a short while, and your dating options might be limited to students at the university. There's not a whole lot to do in Santa Cruz but there are some decent bars and restaurants around downtown Santa Cruz...but they'll be flooded by students most of the year. After a while you might get irritated at how everywhere you go there are gaggles of 20 year olds.

Getting by without a car really depends on where you will be living. The flat area around downtown Santa Cruz is really the only area that this is possible. Some of the bus lines are ok and run pretty frequently but others literally run like 4 times a day. If you're somewhere hilly you will really be unable to do anything without a car. I tried it when I lived there and I was really miserable. And the county is pretty big so to get anywhere you really need a car.

Honestly I'd look at San Francisco and Oakland and see if you can get a job there. You can take Greyhound down to Santa Cruz whenever you want to visit your friends.